The Syntax of Early English - Cryptm.org

258 The syntax of early English‘easy-to-please’, and Chomsky (1981, 1982), Browning (1987), Foldvik (1989),Massam (1992) and Mulder and den Dikken (1992), who have further developedit. One such argument concerns the variety of functions that the nonsubjectgap in the infinitival clause can have. To see this, consider the schematicrepresentations of (1), (2) and (3) given in (6), (7) and (8). In (6), the gap, representedby a trace, is in direct object position, in (7) it is contained within aprepositional phrase that is adjacent to the verb, and in (8) the prepositionalphrase containing the trace is separated from the verb by an intervening objectNP.(6) NP ibe Adj [ to V t i] structure of (1)(7) NP ibe Adj [ to V P t i] structure of (2)(8) NP ibe Adj [ to V NP P t i] structure of (3)In determining the nature of the gaps in (6)–(8), a choice needs to be madebetween NP-movement (or A-movement) and wh-movement (A-bar movement),since these are the two main types of movement that can be responsiblefor a gap in complement position. Now the structures in (6) and (7) mightbe the result of NP-movement: examples (9) and (10), corresponding to sentences(1) and (2), show that the structures [V t] and [V P t] can arise in passives,which are unambiguous instantiations of NP-movement.(9) John iwas finally convinced t iby our arguments.(10) The problem ihas been dealt with t i.However, in 2.6 we noted that, with the exception of a number of idiomaticexpressions such as to take advantage of and to keep tabs on, the sequence [VNP P t] which we find in (8) is not possible in passives: there is nothing like(11) corresponding to (3).(11) *He iwas not got a straight answer from t i.Under the standard generative analysis of passive (see Chomsky 1981, vanRiemsdijk 1982 and Baker, Johnson and Roberts 1989), the past participle in(9) and (10) would be said to absorb the Case that, in the active counterpart,would be assigned to the internal argument. Hence in (9) and (10) the internalargument (John, The problem) moves to the subject position to receive Case.Note that in (10), the phrase dealt with appears to function as a unit withrespect to Case assignment, perhaps through reanalysis of verbprepositioninto a single verb (see Hornstein and Weinberg 1981) or some equivalent likeincorporation of the preposition into the verb; whatever the exact mechanismis, the result is that the internal argument The problem has to move to thesubject position to receive Case. In (11), the process of reanalysis/incorpora-